


The Anchors

by Jerevinan



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Multi, Nightmares, Recurring Nightmares, everyone's having the same bad dream, urban fantasy au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-12-07
Packaged: 2020-10-01 23:30:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20436428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jerevinan/pseuds/Jerevinan
Summary: Lately, they’ve all been having wild and vivid dreams, and they’re pieces of something that hasn’t quite been connected yet.I endorse reading fics on AO3's website, not a cash-grabbing app





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure where I'm going with this yet. I've written other parts of it, and it has the ghost of a plot, but I'm still feeling around with everyone's roles. The first chapter is the only thing I feel confident will stick to canon. Everything else I've written is subject to change, and it might take a while. I figured I'd warn of that before anyone starts it, in case even one person hopes this will update frequently. Unfinished, the first chapter at least has some comfort SoRiKai?

The rubber soles of her shoes slap against the wet pavement. Streetlamps and city lights blur in the puddles like urban watercolors. 

At the intersection, Kairi stops. She thought she caught a glimpse of the backs of their jackets, the artificial colors of the city’s neon signs against their skin and hair, but no one is there. Both of their names are whispers on her lips. 

Her running doesn’t take her far. The skyscrapers tower around her, the thin crowds of people shuffling around her in a haze of cigarette smoke and drunken laughter. 

The silence comes fast, like the snap of a finger to hush a crowd. This time, it silences the entire city. The shock of the abrupt quiet makes her stop in her tracks. The buildings all around her come down like an accordion stack of cards folding in on itself. 

The streets begin to crumble beneath her, slabs of concrete falling into an abyss beneath the city. Little pieces fall into the darkness, chipping away until the entire downtown district disappears.

This has happened before in the realm of sleep, and that familiarity might be what pulls her out of the dream, like the fade that takes place at the close of a movie. The cut takes her back to reality.

She awakens, gasping for air. Right, another one of those recurring nightmares. Riku stirs beside her, one of his muscular arms across her waist. His touch is grounding. Once her eyes focus and allow her to see in the dark bedroom, she notices the shadow falling across her. 

Sora is bent over her, both palms pressing into the mattress on either side of her shoulders. “Kairi? Kairi, are you okay?” His panicked voice doesn’t help her racing heart steady.

“Sora…” She closes her eyes briefly. “I need the bathroom.”

“Oh, right. Sure.” Sora slips away and gives her space to move off the mattress. Before she disappears into the adjacent bathroom, he gives her pause by saying, “Another nightmare?”

“Yeah.”

“I had one, too.”

They peer over at Riku, but he seems undisturbed. Lately, they’ve all been having wild and vivid dreams, and they’re pieces of something that hasn’t quite been connected yet. What they do know is they all involve their city crumbling. It isn’t uncommon for the trio to have these dreams on the same night. That might not be coincidence—they’re so frequent, it’s not surprising when they overlap.

The worst part is Kairi believes that they mean something. That this is all more than coincidence. Something bad is coming. In the pit of her stomach, she feels the anxious twist of newfound fears. No amount of splashing water on her face can get her to calm down. The entire time she is in the bathroom, she can feel Sora’s concerned gaze on the other side of the door.

When she returns to the bedroom, Riku’s awake, too. A wild look lingers in his eyes, but as soon as he sees her, he forces a smile. “You, too?”

“All three of us,” notes Sora, sitting on his knees, his fingers tracing circles in the comforter. “What does it mean?”

“Bad diets? Rough mattress?” suggests Kairi, who wants either of these issues to be true, and not the one that nips at the corner of her mind. It would be much easier if eating more vegetables or replacing the bed solved this issue.

“Maybe.” There’s doubt in Sora’s voice. She sees the same uncertainty on Riku’s face. They all feel it. Something ominous approaches, and not one of them is prepared for whatever it may be. It would be easier to deal with it if they knew what they were looking for, if they knew what all these dreams meant. 

After all, they’re just nightmares right? Recurring, sure, and all three of them have been dreaming up bits of the same event, but that doesn’t give them any founding in reality. Living together, talking about what happened—that must have had an effect on their trio. Planted the ideas in their mind. Such roots have been difficult to rip out of their consciousness. They’re not gardens that can be weeded, not when sleep takes hold. 

“What if we don’t talk about this anymore?” asks Kairi. “If we dwell on it, it shows up subconsciously.”

Riku glances away from her, but she still catches the doubt in his eyes. Sora chews on his lips. None even Kairi believes that it will work, but the ache for comfort lets them stretch toward little lies.

Riku finally lies back down, arm stretched wide over the remaining portion of the bed. His fingers gesture them closer.

“C’mere, you two.” 

Sora slips in first, the smallest of the three, and Kairi wriggles in beside him. Her arm reaches over Sora to rest on Riku’s thigh while they’re within his embrace. They snuggle closer, adjusting their heads so that no one’s hair gets into anyone’s face. 

It makes Kairi feel better, but none of them close their eyes at first. Not for a long time. Even with the curtains drawn, the lights of the city usually slip in through each gap, reflecting onto the walls. Tonight, it seems a little darker. Kairi refuses to leave her safe place and investigate. Not if she’s going to find out the nighttime has swallowed the city whole, as it has in her bad dreams.

She closes her eyes and snuggles as close as she can to her partners. Nothing bad will happen to them if she remains close. No separation, no need to go running for them when she can’t find them. Their steadying breaths anchor her to the present, and become the rhythm in which she falls asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

Roxas hugs a pillow to his chest and stares at the frosted glass windows. There is a hushed feeling that has fallen across their apartment, broken only by the occasional tap of Xion’s fingers on her phone screen and the sounds of shuffling and dishes being moved in the kitchen. 

By this time of day, it ought to be bright outside, beyond the neon displays and streetlamps. No one could talk about anything else this morning when the sun never crested over the horizon. Their neighbors—even the more elusive ones—slipped into the hall to join in the observations and gossip. A group gathered on the rooftop, as if seeing the sky from a higher vantage point would change their perspective.

Roxas is trying hard to ignore it, but his mother and one of his brothers continually send him anxious texts. According to Sora, this is playing out very similarly to a series of dreams he’s been having—shared ones that Kairi and Riku have also experienced. All of them follow the same scenario: the city darkens in patches, sinking into a perpetual nighttime, and the trio cannot find each other as buildings begin to collapse into sinkholes. Some of the details are eerily similar to what’s happening outside. At least they haven’t heard news of any sinkholes.

For the sake of comfort, Roxas refers to it as a coincidence. Even as their mother texts her sons updates of power outages around the city, he tells Sora not to worry.

Meanwhile, his stomach flips. It’s not unusual for him to fret, but he’s gotten pretty adept at hiding it.

He sets his phone face-down on the crowded coffee table when the texts start to get to him. 

“I’m tired,” says Xion, stretching until her feet are sticking out over the edge of the loveseat. She readjusts the pillows behind her head and stares at her phone. “I have to be at work soon. Wake me in ten?” She stifles a yawn with her hand, gaze sliding over to Roxas.

“Sure.” 

When her alarm goes off, the music is loud enough to pound in Roxas’ ears—especially after the unsettling quiet they’ve experienced all day.

“Wake her, would you?” yelps Axel, poking his head out from the kitchen.

“You wake her,” Roxas retorts, but he’s already getting to his feet. First, he shuts off the alarm with a swipe and spares their ear drums. “Xion!” Firmly grabbing her shoulder, he gives her a good shake. The hair across her eyes falls to the sides of her face. 

“Ten more minutes.”

“Work.”

“What about the blackout?”

Half the districts in town are out of power. They started blinking out around noon, one after the other. Axel’s apartment hasn’t been affected, but Sora reports that they lost theirs over an hour ago. Due to the sudden outages, many places can’t operate. One of them happens to be the small record store where Axel works. Xion isn’t so fortunate. The mall has a backup, and people will still be wanting fries and shakes at the food court. 

“Runs on a generator, remember?” 

Xion lets out a sob and slaps a pillow over her head, letting loose a gurgled scream. 

When she finishes, Roxas has one pitiful offering of advice. “Call out?”

The pillow slowly slips off her face and flops to the floor. “I should check with my boss.” 

“Again?”

“Maybe something’s changed.” Xion snatches up her phone. After a beat, she lets out another dramatic sob, which tells Roxas all he needs to know about the status of her job. “Axel! Axel, I need you!”

Axel hurries out of the kitchen. Despite his annoyance at being summoned, there’s concern and fear in his eyes. He runs a hand through his hair and plays at nonchalance, but Roxas and Xion figured him out long ago. It won’t take long before the façade cracks. 

“Yeah?”

“Drive me to work?”

Axel’s gaze shifts from Xion to the window, and then he meets Roxas’ eye. They’re all thinking the same thing. Something out there isn’t right. Everyone can feel something foreboding over the horizon, rising where the sun didn’t.

“We’ll all go,” says Axel.

“All of us?” Roxas frowns. Today was supposed to be his lazy day around the house, wearing his pajama bottoms and eating a pint of ice cream on the sofa. 

Isa appears from the kitchen, toweling off his hands. “Why?”

Xion pops up her head. “Pretty please?”

“I’m busy baking.”

“Stress baking,” corrects Roxas, having learned long ago that Isa seldom bakes unless there’s something bothering him. Today, Isa has made three different types of cookies as well as a batch of cupcakes and a pan of brownies. 

“I’ve now decided you’re not having anything I make. There’s far too much sugar in your diet anyway.” Isa casts him a look that is supposed to be threatening, but Roxas only snorts at him.

“Good luck.”

Axel waves his arms. “Hello? We have to get Xion to work.”

“You have to get Xion to work. Take _him_ with you.” Isa points sharply with one finger, half the towel in his fist and the rest swinging from the sudden movement. 

“I’m not putting on pants.”

Roxas makes his way back to the sofa, but a small hand catches his wrist. 

“Roxas, please?” 

It’s hard to refuse Xion. It’s even a pain to refuse Axel, who looks like he’ll toss Roxas over his shoulder and haul him out to the car, even if he is underdressed. Damn height differences. Axel is a skinny tree limb, but he has strong arms and an even stronger ability to scold them all to death. 

“You owe me,” Roxas tells Xion, even though he would never put her in debt for a favor. Had she been anyone else, he would make sure to use it against her at the most inopportune time. But she’s not Isa or Axel or one of his brothers, and he’s not about to abandon her during this crisis.

Roxas hunts down a clean pair of jeans and grabs his phone off the charger. His brother has left a few more texts, but Axel is calling out to him from the living room. Good, that gives him an excuse to delay reading them. With a shake of his head, he attempts to discharge any thoughts of his brother’s dreams from his mind. Don’t people have weird nightmares like that all the time? Sora is making a big deal out of nothing.

“Come on, come on,” says Axel, waving his two roommates toward the door. 

Annoyed by the pushing, Roxas opts for a playful insult. One he knows Axel _hates_. “Shut up, Mom.”

“Don’t ‘Mom’ me.” Axel whacks Roxas softly on the back of the head. “I’m just trying to get Xion to work in time.”

“That makes you sound even more like a parent—specifically like my mom.” Roxas suspects his mother might have had an influence on Axel over the years, even if the two can barely stand one another.

“I’d like to see you talk to your mom this way.” 

Roxas ignores that comment, knowing full well he’d never dare. “Everyone forced to work is gonna be late. I bet half the street lights are down.”

They find out quickly just how right Roxas is about the state of the roads; police have to direct most of traffic the closer they get to the mall, and some downed intersections are unmanned and terrifying. Axel curses a few times as several cars take advantage of this, cutting him off when it is his turn.

Roxas laughs. It’s due to nerves rather than humor, but that isn’t the way Axel reads it.

“You can always drive us home.”

“Should’ve made Isa drive.”

“We’d have to stop for more sugar. He’s used up just about all we have in the house.” Axel flips the blinker and turns into the mall parking lot. “Shit. Sure are a lot of cars here. Didn’t anyone else hear about the fucking blackouts?”

Roxas grins. “Is that a rhetorical question, or—”

“Of course it was! They’re all morons.”

Xion scoots between the spaces in the front seats and pats both of them on the shoulder. “It could be raining blood and fire out there, and some old guy will be upset if I don’t smile when I ask him if he wants fries with that.”

“I’ll give him fries,” mutters Axel darkly as he pulls into a parking space. He shuts off the lights and cuts the engine. “Xion, are you sure about this? We’ll manage if you lose your job.”

“But you valiantly guided me through the worst traffic to get here! I can’t waste your sacrifice.” She reaches over and pecks Axel on the cheek. “Thanks for driving.”

Axel waves it off, and when he catches Roxas smirking at him, he stabs an elbow into his ribs. For a moment, they enjoy the normalcy of their strange family-like circle. It’s easy to forget—if only for a second—that the sun hasn’t come up and their city is going dark.

“I’m scared,” says Xion after a minute.

“We’ll walk you in,” says Roxas, offering Axel’s services alongside his as revenge for electing everyone to drive Xion to work earlier. 

There isn’t any complaint from Axel, however, only the swing of the driver-side door as it opens. No one wants to be alone right now. Well, maybe Isa does, even in these conditions, since he seems to be fine staying back at the apartment by himself. In fact, he’s probably relishing the silence. 

Xion trots ahead of them, head raised bravely. There are a few people out in the parking lot; some are in small groups, staring up at the sky. Others are herding their kids into the mall as if forcing themselves to pretend it is any normal day. 

Inside, the mall is dimly lit by generators. The crowds are thin, each footfall or noisy toddler’s voice echoing in the two-story center. Xion smooths down her bedhead and drops her cap over it.

“Doesn’t feel right,” says Axel. “You’d think people would want to stay home. I know I do.” He makes a show of shuddering, which is about how Roxas feels, even if he doesn’t express it. 

“I’ll be fine now,” says Xion once they’ve approached the food court. She spins around, wearing her customer service smile. “Pick me up?”

“Damn right we will. Don’t go outside—we’ll come in and get you.”

“There you go again, sounding like my mom,” says Roxas. “She’s rubbing off on you. Bet she’ll be glad to hear that.”

Axel lightly elbows him in the shoulder. “Speaking of your mom, how many times has she texted you since this started?”

“Dozens.” It’s not an exaggeration. With every news release comes an update from Roxas’ mother, listing every district that has lost power or if they’ve managed to communicate whatsoever with nearby cities. Right now, they’re closed off from contact with the rest of the world, and outside of local radio, they have no incoming information. That might be the most unsettling part of all. No one knows what’s going on outside of their area, and no one outside might have an idea of what’s happening inside. The unknowingness of it all lends to the scary atmosphere. 

If only it were a rainy day, with clouds in the sky. Something that didn’t show the stars in the sky above them. The weather could be blamed for this phenomenon. All they’d have to do is blame it on a bad storm. 

Roxas texts his brother as they’re heading back out to the car. 

_come over asap_


End file.
